NEW PALTZ - A group opposed to same-sex marriage is raising money for a roadside billboard that will proclaim homosexuality is not an innate characteristic but a lifestyle that can be left behind.

The billboard, to be placed on the south side of state Route 299 in New Paltz, will feature a black-and-white photograph of Stephen Bennett, who says he was a homosexual before a religious conversion enabled him to become straight. His wife and two children also are in the photo, which carries the caption, "Wonderful husband. Loving father. Former homosexual. Jesus Christ changes lives."

The billboard is part of the New York Christian Coalition's "Truthful Witness Campaign," which has, since April, picketed the ongoing same-sex weddings at the LeFevre House Bed and Breakfast on Southside Avenue in New Paltz.

Campaign director Diane Garrison said the group is putting up the billboard as part of a new push to promote "traditional" marriage in response to events in New Paltz.

"The whole idea is to raise a billboard ministry (in New Paltz) specializing in reparative therapy," said the Rev. Bill Banuchi, executive director of the New York Christian Coalition. Reparative therapy is a controversial form of treatment aimed at changing a person's sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual.

"We want to let people know that there is another way," Banuchi said, "that there is hope for people who want to get their lives straight in that sense."

Bennett runs Huntington, Conn.-based Stephen Bennett Ministries, which counsels gays and their loved ones who wish to leave the gay life. Bennett said that the billboard is offered free of charge to groups like the Christian Coalition.

Bennett said attempts to place the billboard along a road in Albany were rebuffed by a Louisiana-based advertising company because of its content. Garrison, however, said two companies she approached with the idea, Clear Channel and Highway Displays Inc., said they would display the billboard as long as it was not obscene or offensive.

Garrison said the Truthful Witness Campaign was reaching out to area churches for money and support the effort. Last month, at the Faith Assembly of God church in Poughkeepsie, the group organized the airing of a simulcast by the conservative Family Research Council on the importance of maintaining traditional marriage.

The campaign also plans to send an open letter to area pastors seeking support. And in the future, Garrison hopes to arrange a personal appearance by Bennett in the area.

Homosexuality "is an unnatural, unhealthy lifestyle," said Garrison, who likened homosexuality to drug and alcohol addiction. "We don't believe in hatred or gay bashing, but we don't believe homosexuality is right, and we will stand up for that."

The American Psychiatric Association dropped homosexuality from a roster of mental disorders in 1973 under pressure from the nascent gay rights movement, and most mainstream mental health experts today regard efforts to change sexual orientation as ineffective and sometimes harmful to the patient's emotional well-being.

James Fallarino, spokesman for the New Paltz Equality Initiative, which has organized more than 100 same-sex weddings in New Paltz, said he supports the Christian Coalition's right to advertise its message but doubts the billboard will have much impact.

"All people have a right to profess their beliefs, just as we do," Fallarino said. "But I don't think it's going to change anybody's mind. I think they're wasting their money."

"The American Psychiatric Association dropped homosexuality from a roster of mental disorders in 1973 under pressure from the nascent gay rights movement, and most mainstream mental health experts today regard efforts to change sexual orientation as ineffective and sometimes harmful to the patient's emotional well-being."

However, as noted on WorldNet Daily, "in 1999, the American Psychological Association published in its peer-reviewed journal, APA Bulletin, a report disputing the harmfulness of child molestation. Titled "A Meta-Analytic Examination of Assumed Properties of Child Sexual Abuse Using College Samples," the report by Bruce Rind, et al., claimed child sexual abuse could be harmless and beneficial."

So the big question is whether there is any perversion the APA will not endorse.

4
posted on 08/12/2004 6:41:07 PM PDT
by asmith92008
(If we buy into the nonsense that we always have to vote for RINOs, we'll just end up taking the horn)

"We don't believe in hatred or gay bashing, but we don't believe homosexuality is right, and we will stand up for that."

SEE??! There is your problem right there! You simply cannot be an unbeliever in homosexuality and at the same time claim to be "unhateful" or "non-gay bashing", for the buggerers will accuse you of both.

The American Psychiatric Association dropped homosexuality from a roster of mental disorders in 1973 under pressure from the nascent gay rights movement, and most mainstream mental health experts today regard efforts to change sexual orientation as ineffective and sometimes harmful to the patient's emotional well-being.

Dr. Robert L. Spitzer -- an acknowledged advocate of the APA's move to declassify same-sex attraction as a mental disorder -- is on record as saying that reparative therapy can be effective and is not intrinsically harmful to the patient's emotional well-being.

The results of a study conducted by Dr. Robert L. Spitzer have just been published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, Vol. 32, No. 5, October 2003, pp. 403-417.

Spitzer's findings challenge the widely-held assumption that a homosexual orientation is "who one is" -- an intrinsic part of a person's identity that can never be changed.

The study has attracted particularly attention because its author, a prominent psychiatrist, is viewed as a historic champion of gay activism. Spitzer played a pivotal role in 1973 in removing homosexuality from the psychiatric manual of mental disorders.

. . .

Is reorientation therapy harmful? For the participants in our study, Spitzer notes, there was no evidence of harm.

Christians do not believe homosexuality is right and we will stand up for that. It is not the Christians that are hate mongers and bigots. To say we dont believe in homosexuality does not make us haters. The only hate being spread is from the gays. Those are the ones you see standing in the streets using vulgar and nasty language and calling heterosexuals names.

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